


ghost in the wind

by pandabrite



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, F/F, One Shot, Pining, lupcretia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-01
Updated: 2017-11-01
Packaged: 2019-01-27 20:23:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,437
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12589860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pandabrite/pseuds/pandabrite
Summary: lucretia knows what she must do, but there is a hole in her heart. she seeks to mend it in the only way she knows how-- writing. but some wounds aren't meant to be healed, some wounds must be worn like a badge of honor. she must brave through this pain. and she knows she has to do it alone.





	ghost in the wind

**Author's Note:**

> this is my first fic here and also my first prompt of NaNoWriMo! i'm following a list of prompts posted by tumblr user lucretia-the-director. i haven't publicly posted writing in a long time. i hope you enjoy! this first prompt was 'write a love letter.'

Taako and Barry had come back with nothing.

It was the middle of the night… perhaps they thought their entrance to the Starblaster was without notice. 

But she always noticed.

She waited with bated breath, hoping that when the two entered, it would be followed with a boisterous laugh, a warm sound that radiated sunshine-- a smiling face… a happy Lup. Lup. 

Lucretia’s chest tightened, and her fingers twisted into the fabric covering it… it felt like she’d swallowed something sharp, something that stung from her tongue to her stomach… something that burned and yet felt cold as ice… 

When Taako and Barry entered the starblaster, there was nothing. There was silence. A familiar and overwhelming sound, lately. Dinners were silent. Mornings were silent. Their family was fragmented, both literally and… and figuratively-- they were all broken people, lost to the guilt, to the apathy, to the… to the strain their mission had caused them, to the desperation for things to work in their favor when really? Was it a pipe dream? It seemed to ghost from their fingers each time they got near…

Lucretia… she-- she couldn’t fucking take it anymore.

She didn’t sleep that night.

The woman sat alone in her room, overhead lights off… a single candle burned, propped haphazardly atop a book on her bed directly in front of her. The flame danced along the room, and it… God, it reminded her again of Lup. Of Lup. Of her warmth, her determination, her strength, her… 

She dipped a quill in rich, navy ink… and she began to write. She wrote. She wrote. She wrote.

It wasn’t beautiful. It wasn’t poetic. Lucretia didn’t write in those terms-- she wrote in facts, she wrote what she knew, she wrote what she saw, what she felt… there was no purple prose, there was no conflation of the emotions she felt…

And she… she remained calm. She remained calm. It was the only thing she could do. She had to be, fuck, she had to be strong. She had to be her own strength, and she had to be the strength of all of her friends. She would be wearing the world on her shoulders soon, and she had to know that she could do it… and the only person she couldn’t reach out to… the only person she couldn’t speak to, couldn’t see, couldn’t save… was Lup.

When she finished articulating what she needed, she leaned back and heaved a sigh… 

It was like picking splinters out of a sealed wound. Except they kept coming. There was no relief. This letter, this message to no one, that Lucretia thought, prayed, would give some relief provided… nothing. No cathartic sense of closure, no hope for the future…

No one to deliver it to.

She allowed herself to pick up the parchment after it dried for some time. And she reread it… Perhaps rereading it would provide that sense of relief she so longed for…

In perfect, navy ink, there written was a letter professing her fears, her desires and her love...

_Lup,_

__

__

Our family is broken without you.

We have searched high and low for you. Taako and Barry combed the countryside. And yet, it’s as though you’ve vanished from this world. 

I had hoped. I had prayed that we would find you before now. That I could see your face one more time before you forget me. Before everyone forgets me. Before they forget you, Lup.

I know why you left. I sensed it in your soul long before you committed. But I was too cowardly to approach you, to seek some solace in you. To offer you some of my own. This mission, this journey, has picked us apart at the seams. You, the thread that kept us together, optimistic, level headed… you were taking this the worst and I knew it.

And I’m so sorry.

I’m going to save this plane, Lup. What we did here was not right. I know you realize it. I know it hurt you. I only wish now I had reached out to you… before you were gone.

Lup, there are so many words that are unspoken that I wish I had found the courage to share. You are the light in the darkest of times. I can still feel you here, sitting in my bed, your weight, your warmth… reading old logs of our journey. Reminiscing. I remember the first time that you came to my quarters seeking solace, the first cycle we lost Taako… I remember making you laugh, I remember sharing our fears and our hopes and our dreams… I remember holding you through the night, and I remember thinking to myself that if I could keep you from ever feeling that way again, I would… I failed that, I suppose. 

I remember 4am coffee and… I remember the time that I tried to make scrambled eggs and they were just awful, but you smiled and told me they were the best eggs I’d ever made. The only eggs you’d ever tasted of mine, but it didn’t matter. 

And I remember you confiding in me about any manner of things. I know that you had Taako to share your secrets with, but it felt so refreshing that you came to me with things… and I shared with you. And it was emboldening. You emboldened me in a way I don’t think I could ever properly express in writing. 

I miss you.

Lup, I never told you. I could never confide in you my biggest secret. Not for bitterness, not for jealousy. I am happiest when you are happy. When you performed your duet with Barry, it was no surprise. You’d told me all about these feelings. These warm moments of romance amidst the turmoil of our lives. And my heart soared for you, Lup. To find love in as hopeless a place as this. To find happiness. I could want nothing more for you. 

… But Lup. I love you.

I love everyone, but, you, Lup… Lup, I love you. Your radiance is like sunlight to the face of the moon-- with it, my light is bright, my light is pure. Without you here, my light wanes, but… I can be strong.

The new moon doesn’t just disappear.

I miss you so much. I wish that I could speak these words to you in person. 

I have so many things I have to do. I’m going to save this plane, Lup. I’m going to save us all. I only wish that I could have saved you.

No one will remember you. I’m so sorry. But only for a short time. And I will cherish my memories of you, along with those memories of everyone else. And I will hold them to my heart like a beacon of hope. They will remember you. And when they do, the world will be safe. That is my promise to you. I will undo what has been done to this plane. I will save this world. I will save us.

… 

I can only hope that I will see you again someday. 

_Love,  
Lucretia_

She felt no relief.

\---

Lucretia stood on the bow of the Starblaster, her eyes clouded over in indiscernible emotion. She was rigid, her shoulders lifted, stiff, her back straight… and in her hands rested an envelope. Scrawled across the front of that envelope in neat, navy blue ink was ‘Lup.’ The back was sealed with a wax stamp… 

She seemed to be… waiting. Waiting. But waiting would do no good. There was no running away from this anymore. There was no turning her back to what she had to do. Not anymore. 

A stiff wind blew from the south.

And as it did, two slender fingers lifted the letter, and like ripping off a bandage it was released. It fluttered in the breeze, whipped by torrents of air as it soared off… and off… and off… and it was… 

Gone.

Lucretia felt as though she were standing on a precipice. As if she could fall at the simplest whim. Her every act now existed in a terrifying balance. A tightrope of choices that would have to… have to lead her to the right ending. To the right ending for them all.

And she turned away from the bow. And she walked. She was poised, her face set, her eyes devoid of the hopelessness and uncertainty they had carried before… she had things to do. Things she could wait for no longer… She had to be brave. She had to weather the storm.

She had to save them all.


End file.
